


now winging selves sing sweetly

by iwillnotbecaged



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: M/M, Non-Binary Sam, Sam-Centric, Secret Santa Fic Swap, Wingfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-16
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-09-08 20:12:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8859409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwillnotbecaged/pseuds/iwillnotbecaged
Summary: According to the stories, all families used to have a Trait. Deer antlers, tiger stripes, cat ears — something that marked them as a member of their family and that was passed from mother to child. Traits were less common now, although not quite rare enough to cause people to turn and gawk when someone with a lion’s mane or a lemur’s tail walked by.The Wilsons had wings.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bioloyg](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bioloyg/gifts).



> Huge thank you to [permashift](http://permashift.tumblr.com) for doing a read through for me!
> 
> Title from an e. e. cummings poem

According to the stories, all families used to have a Trait. Deer antlers, tiger stripes, cat ears — something that marked them as a member of their family and that was passed from mother to child. Traits were less common now, although not quite rare enough to cause people to turn and gawk when someone with a lion’s mane or a lemur’s tail walked by.

No one knew for sure why some of the Traits had been lost. The scientific community said it was simply an adaptation, the human race evolving as always. The more superstitious believed it was a punishment, a curse on the family for some sort of grave sin. Sam Wilson had never given it much thought because his family still carried their Trait.

The Wilsons had wings. His mother’s wings were a bright copper that matched the sparkle in her eyes. Sarah’s were tawny and silken, a perfect complement to the umber skin that she kept just as soft. Gideon’s were snow-white, almost blinding in the sun. He spent hours making sure every feather stayed pristine.

Sam’s wings were unique, even in the Wilson family. They were black, a deep obsidian that took on an iridescence in the sunlight. Sam loved his wings — he would stand in the backyard and stretch them out to the sides, spreading them as wide as he could, then turn them this way and that to watch the hints of blue and purple and even green peeking out of the shiny feathers. He was proud that no one else in the family had wings like his; he felt like he was special, like he was made for something great.

Until the day he came home from school and ran to his room sobbing. Darlene followed him and sat next to him on his bed.

“What is it, baby?” She rubbed his back gently, right between his shoulder blades at the root of his wings.

“J-Jake said — he s-said my wings — were ugly!” Sam said through his hiccuping sobs. “He s-said I look like a — like a _grackle_. And that I’m j-just as annoying as one, too!”

“Oh, baby, come here.” Sam’s wings were pulled in tight against his body, and Darlene settled him on her lap and wrapped her wings around him. She rocked him back and forth for a while, letting him cry into her shoulder.

When his sobs began to quiet down, she spoke. “Do you know why there are so many grackles in cities?”

“No,” Sam sniffed.

“It’s because they’re resourceful. Other birds have to find a new place to go when humans move into an area, but not grackles. They find a way to get what they need and turn it into an opportunity.”

Sam lifted his head to look at her. “Really?”

Darlene smiled down at him. “Yes, really. Now, Jake probably didn’t know that, and it doesn’t make it okay that he was mean to you. But sometimes people are mean, and when they are, you have a choice. You can let it make you run away from people, like the birds who leave their homes and find a new place to live. You can let it make you last out at others, too, like a blue jay. Or you can be like a grackle and see it as an opportunity.”

“An opportunity to do what?”

“To be kind. To understand someone else. Some people are mean for meanness sake. But you’ll find that most people are mean because they’re hurting. And if you’re resourceful, like a grackle, you can find ways to be good and kind that will hopefully make it so that there are fewer mean people in the world.”

Sam straightened a few of his feathers that had gotten bent while he was crying, then shrugged. “I guess it wouldn’t be so bad to be a grackle.”

“No, I don’t think it would.”

 

Sam was sitting at the lunch table, only half paying attention as his girlfriend Leila talked to her friend Brisa about some movie they had seen the weekend before. They were mostly raving about how hot the actors were, but Sam didn’t mind; they _were_ pretty cute, if you liked conventionally attractive white boys.

“And the way they did the wings! So cool!” Sam’s ears perked up when Brisa mentioned wings.

“Oh my god, yes. They looked amazing. You couldn’t even tell they weren’t real,” Leila gushed.

“Yeah, but also the symbolism? How when they finally revealed their wings, Daniel’s were all bright and shiny and Malachi’s were black? So brilliant.”

“What was brilliant about it?” Sam was pretty sure he knew the answer, but he asked anyway.

Brisa turned towards him to explain, practically bouncing in her seat with excitement. “Well, you see, Daniel and Malachi used to be best friends, but something obviously happened and now they hate each other and the whole time Lily is trying to figure out what happened and bring them back together. So during the big reveal where you finally see their wings, you realize that Daniel is an angel and Malachi is a _fallen_ angel. And that’s why they’ve been fighting. And they didn’t have to explain any of it — they just showed it with the color of their wings! Isn’t that cool?”

Sam set his pizza slice down, no longer interested in it. “Yeah, sure. That’s real cool.”

Leila looked at him questioningly across the table, but he pretended not to see it. She steered Brisa towards a new topic anyway and the bell rang a few minutes later.

Leila caught up to him at his locker after school.

“We still on for Luke’s Halloween party on Saturday?”

He shoved his textbook into his backpack. “Yeah, sure. Just don’t ask me to dress up as some bullshit fallen angel.”

Leila looked hurt by his tone. “Of course not. But you know it’s just a movie, right? It’s like those old westerns where the bad guys wore black hats and the good guys wore white ones.”

“Uh huh. And like Disney movies where the villains wear black. And like spy movies where the bad guys wear black. And like Lord of the Rings with the black gate and the black speech and all the rest of it.” He slammed his locker and started walking away.

Leila jogged to catch up to him and grabbed his arm, forcing him to stop and turn towards her. “Hey! I get that you’re upset, but you don’t get to pull that kind of shit with me.”

“Sorry,” he mumbled. “But doesn’t it bug you? That black always means something evil or dangerous?”

Leila shrugged. “I mean, I guess. But it’s not like that makes everyone think we’re evil because we’re black. Or that you’re evil because you have black wings.”

Sam just raised an eyebrow at her.

She rolled her eyes. “Okay, maybe some people think that. But they’re idiots.”

“Yeah, they are. But I still don’t like it. I’m not — my wings aren’t a bad omen. I’m not a bad omen. And I hate that there are people out there who think that way.”

Leila reached for his hand and squeezed it gently. “Okay. That’s okay, Sam.” She led him towards the front door of the school and out into the sunlight. “So what _do_ you want to dress up as? And don’t say Gabe Jones — you’ve done that four years in a row now.”

“Awww, come on! You’d make a great Peggy Carter!”

“Nope. Not happening. We can do better than that.”

 

Sam stood naked in front of the mirror, far back enough to fit at least part of his wings into the frame. He studied the planes of his chest, the muscle in his thighs, the varying shades of him, from his palms to his arms to his eyes to his hair to the feathers of his wings.

The varying shades of them. Their skin. Their eyes. Their wings.

They. Them.

Yes, that was better.

 

When their commanding officer first asked them if they wanted to consider the Falcon program, they figured it was some sort of a prank. When Sam realized it wasn’t, they jumped at the opportunity.

Riley’s wings were the color of the desert sand that slipped into every crack and crevice. Every time they flew a night mission, Sam would take the specially formulated grease paint and cover each individual feather so that Riley couldn’t be seen from the ground. They didn’t know if it was the intimacy of the task or the sheer number of hours it took, but at some point Riley became more than just a partner.

Every once in awhile, the two of them had a few spare moments alone and would end up wrapped in each other’s arms and wings. Sam looked forward to those moments of privacy, to those brief respites when they could be an uninhibited version of themself. Riley loved every inch of them - their wings and their body and their heart and their soul. Sam loved him right back, loved the picture they made, how beautifully they blended together despite the contrasts. 

Because only one of them required camouflaging, they were assigned night missions often, and it earned them a variety of nicknames. Midnight Angels. Dark Knights. Falcons of Death. Riley laughed at the titles, but each one sat heavy as a stone in Sam’s stomach.

The night that Riley didn’t return with them, they couldn’t help but wonder if maybe it was their fault. Had they not covered Riley’s bright wings enough that time? Or were theirs actually a bad omen? Was their wings’ blackness truly a harbinger of death and emptiness and sorrow?

They knew it was just the grief talking, and tried to push the thoughts aside, but they could never quite get the idea out of their head after that.

 

Based on their first meeting, if Steve Rogers had been born with a Trait, the serum must have wiped it out because from where Sam was sitting, he was nothing but muscle and sass. Sam reevaluated a few days later when Steve showed up on their doorstep with what could only be described as puppy dog eyes. Sam just sighed and jumped back into the fray.

Hydra considered natural Traits to be a relic of the past and believed that industrial modification was the future. The Winter Soldier was their greatest achievement up to that point, but Sam wasn’t thinking about that when his metal hand grabbed and twisted their wing, sending them catapulting off the side of the helicarrier.

The physical pain was excruciating, but it was nothing compared to the gut-wrenching feeling of being grounded and realizing there was nothing they could do to help Steve.

Hill’s voice came over the comm and they shoved the pain aside to go after Rumlow. Sam fought hard, holding their wings tight against their body and then ran, cursing their inability to fly when windows and beams started shattering around them.

Sam flung their wings out with a scream as they tumbled from the building, falling desperately toward the helicopter. They made it somehow and collapsed on the floor, knives of pain shooting through them, dark, wet blood glistening on their wings where the feathers had been ripped out by the Winter Soldier.

The feeling of complete and utter helplessness didn’t fade until they heard Steve rasp out a quiet “on your left” from his hospital bed.

 

Sam watched Bucky where he stood on the front porch of the cabin looking out over the snow-covered fields. Sam wasn’t sure why he insisted on being out there — Bucky complained about the cold even when he was wearing three layers of clothing.

The kettle whistled on the stove behind them and they went to pour the hot water into the waiting mugs. They were a bit chagrined at using packets of hot chocolate mix rather than making it themself, but they were working with what they had in the safe house. They stirred the hot chocolate, watching the powder swirl around until it dissolved, then took both mugs out to the porch.

“Here you go,” they offered. Bucky turned to accept the mug with his shivering right hand and held it close, sighing as the steam warmed his face.

Sam’s wings fluttered, wanting to reach out and wrap Bucky up and keep him warm. They stretched them out just a bit, and Bucky shuddered. They tucked them back in quickly.

“Oh, sorry. Do they bother you?”

Bucky gave them a puzzled look. “What? No. Why would they?”

“Well, you — I mean, some people — never mind. Forget I said anything.” They leaned against the railing next to Bucky and sipped their hot chocolate.

Bucky spoke quietly after a few moments. “They always kept the lights on. In the lab, in the rooms where I was kept right before and right after missions, even as much as they could during missions. It was always white walls and bright lights. Everything was stark and sterile and cold.”

Sam wasn’t sure where Bucky was going with this, but they didn’t interrupt.

“Darkness meant I was either on a mission, hidden somewhere in a sniper’s nest where I was in control, or in cryo, where I didn’t have to be afraid or in pain.” Bucky reached out and brushed his fingertips against the very tip of Sam’s wing. “I’m not afraid of the dark, Sam. When I look at your wings, I see safety. Peace. Home.”

Sam inhaled sharply and stretched their wings back out. Bucky’s gaze fell to the place where he had grabbed Sam’s wing during the fight. He lifted his right hand again and gave them a questioning look. When Sam didn’t react, Bucky reached out to stroke the black feathers that had grown back in while they and Steve searched for Bucky.

Bucky’s touch was gentle and sent a shiver down Sam’s spine, goosebumps rising on their skin. Electricity shot through them as Bucky’s hand continued to explore and they found themself leaning into Bucky’s space. Sam was close enough now that they could hear Bucky’s teeth chattering.

“You’re cold,” Sam whispered. “We should go inside.”

Bucky just hummed in response and stayed where he was, eyes fixed on where his fingers were buried in Sam’s feathers. He pulled his hand back slightly when Sam took hold of his waist and pulled him in closer, stretching their wings out slowly.

Sam extended their wings as far as they could on the porch, then curled them around Bucky, blocking the wind and isolating them both from the cold of the outside world. Sam’s hands and wings pulled Bucky even closer into the warmth of their body, until Bucky was flush against their chest, their breath mingling in the air between them.

Sam’s feathers ruffled softly when Bucky’s nose nuzzled their cheek and then shuddered when their lips brushed. The first kiss was barely a kiss, small and subtle and hesitant. The second was sweet, close-lipped and chaste. The third lingered, lips parting and testing, pressure building. The fourth was desperate and panting, and led directly into the fifth and the sixth until Sam lost count and couldn’t think of anything beyond themself and Bucky and the shelter of their wings.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Now Winging Selves Sing Sweetly](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13267506) by [Lucifuge5](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lucifuge5/pseuds/Lucifuge5)




End file.
